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Forum:Destroyermen
I just read the book Into the Storm by Taylor Anderson. It's the first book of a series about a few WWII ships ripped from their world and sent into a parallel Earth where the K/T extinction event never happen. The Velociraptors evolved into a sentient species called the Grik and became the dominant species of Africa. Lemurs evolved into an intelligent species in Madagascar, protected by their isolation. The Grik invaded Madagascar eventually and the Lemurians had to flee. They lived on huge ships for ages and eventually settled Indonesia. Much later the Grik learned shipbuilding from an earlier human ship which had slipped between universes, and are preparing to attack the Lemurians. The "main" ship which came through from WWII, an obsolescent USN destroyer commissioned in 1919, is helping the Lemurians prepare to meet that attack in exchange for a home port and source of supplies. It's the setup for a series that's up to seven books at this time. I intend to read them all eventually, but it's not a huge priority. One thing that annoyed me about the first book was that it was divided into just a few very long chapters that each could easily have been broken up into several shorter chapters apiece. So it's the kind of book that I'd have to read on vacation or over the holidays or something; the format requires that it be read in a few large sittings rather than broken up into bite sized chunks that can be easily picked off one at a time over the course of a busy day. But I liked the first book and I like the story it promises to lead to. It all sort of reminds me of a cross between Birmo's Axis of Time trilogy (which you may recall I enjoyed tremendously) and that "Clan of the Claw" shared universe anthology that HT contributed to last year. Just wondering if anyone else had read it. It seems like the sort of thing that would appeal to those who share our common interests. Turtle Fan (talk) 04:29, September 26, 2012 (UTC) I'm following the series SJ. Although I have to warn you, the major flaw with the series are the characters. They're all two dimensional, and the villains are all one dimensional. However, the one saving grace of the series which, in my opinion lets Mr Anderson tower over Turtledove like a colossi is the entertainment value. Mr Anderson knows the stories are dumb as a post so he sets out to have some bloody fun; And I did too. Like I said before, the characters are the books let down, and the villains are so cartoonishly villainous to the point where you can practically rename all of them “Evil McEvil.” My own personal favourite characters are Courtney Bradford, an eccentric Australian who's played up for laughs, and Dennis Silver, who's a cool, survive anything with wit, wilds and sarcasm character who never ever ends up wearing out his welcome. The battles are also nail bitingly intense, the best is the big naval battle during the climax of book 3. Character development is practically non-existent, and what little there is, moves at the speed of your average glacier. The other problem I have is the mysterious event that transports them to the other world. At first, it feels like a one in a million chance occurrence like this only happens every 10,000 years or something, but it just conveniently pops up every now and then like membership for an exclusive club. In the end, it's worth checking out, but only if your in the mode for some dumb, entertaining fun. Mr Nelg :Thanks Nelg. Everything you say rings fairly true with what I've read so far. I enjoy Bradford immensely; he's obviously such a shameless plot convenience, but he's entertaining enough that I don't care. Silva's certainly memorable, though his thoughtless self-indulgence annoys me. I like Reddy so far; he's not the most interesting character I've ever seen, but his perspective is good and he weighs the big issues of the story in a serious, open-minded way. I can see myself growing to like Shinya if my suspicions about him are correct, but he's playing it so close to the chest as of the end of ItS that I can't tell. (And how convenient that the only Japanese sailor they were able to capture alive just happens to have a personality profile so far outside the norm for his service, enough to make him useful as a member of a USN crew.) :Otherwise the Walker crew is full of dozens of characters who just don't make much of an impression on me; and what's worse, Anderson seems to assume that they have. So he tosses around names without bothering to reintroduce the characters and I get lost until someone I do remember shows up. (The Mice--God I hate those guys. What's the point of them?) I also don't like the way he'll suddenly shift from one person's POV to another within the same scene. That's confusing. :But as you say, it's not about the characters. It does sort of remind me of Axis of Time, which I enjoyed quite a lot. The characters there were better, interesting enough to carry a story, even though they didn't have to. Turtle Fan (talk) 19:46, September 27, 2012 (UTC) :::I'm reading the series too. It's not too bad. Reminds me of a cross between Stirling's Nantucket series and Birmo's Axis of Time. Some of the humans that came into the parallel before the Americans remind me of the stock pulp lost civilizations....degenerate Aztecs, lost colonies, pirates who entered throught the portal...something out of Burroughs or Howard. Entertaining series. And at least it's not Conroy!JudgeFisher (talk) 21:47, October 1, 2012 (UTC)